Probelems telling which way is right or left

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I have always had trouble with my rights and lefts, and it just occurred to me that it may be an autism thing.

Every time I have to tell right from left it takes me at least 3 seconds to remember which is which. I have a number of different ways of telling them apart like holding up the hand that I write with and I know that it's my right hand because I am right handed, and another common thing I do is recall a mental photo of me driving and note which side of the road I'm on which I know is always the right side. I still get it wrong occasionally, although it used to be much worse when I first learned to drive and it caused some serious problems because directions are always given like "turn right" and "turn left" and I got it wrong a lot of the time, even when I got it right it took me 5-10 seconds to figure it out. I never had any explanation as to why I have these problems, and it is annoying enough that I would like to know what's up with that. I know that I'm not dyslexic because I have no trouble with reading.

Is this a common thing among autistic people?

I don't really know if it's an autism thing, but this happens to me as well. Almost caused my driver to drive into a bush once because of it lol. Seems it's worse for you though.

Yes it's an autism thing, it's also a dyspraxia thing too. My dad still gets this mixed up and he only had ADHD. So I have to point and say "go that way" I don't tell him left or right or he might make the wrong turn.

I don't know if it's common for autistic people, but I have that problem too. When I was told to turn right, while learning how to drive, I would go left instead and vice versa.

My neurotypical wife has trouble distinguishing right from left.

I don't.

I don't have trouble with left or right. But, with a map, I will almost always mix up east and west. It has something to do with relating what the page shows and the actual space and orientation I am in. I swear, my dad could be spun in circles and still find his way out of anywhere. Me? Pffffttttt.....

So bad that one time, a girlfriend was driving. I was (supposed to be) the navigator. We drove two hours back to the city after a bit of time in a cabin in the Poconos. Came to a turn and I got things wrong...actually almost wound up back where we started before figuring things out...... I'm fine with north and south....go figure.....

It's weird how I can invert things.

But, I can read mirrored writing (I always read the subway signs in the reflections), upside down writing (Found this out looking at teachers desks) and mirrored and upside down writing (Just had to find out). I have to work a little harder on that one though.

How weird is that?

I always get r and l mixed up.

I like that line from the Matrix.
"Go through the door on your left"
(Neo tries the door on his right)
"No your Other Left!"

Yeah... I mix up left/right and east/west. Not all the time, but often enough to have noticed it.

I think it's a language thing. I can take directions (tell me to go left, I go left) but can't reliably give them (if I tell you to go left, often I mean right).

Always have mixed them up - verbal prompts from a satnav cause endless hilarity!
I just tell people to point if they are showing me where to go and I do the same if in the passenger seat...

I can do that too. I was actually rather surprised when I learned that most people can't.

I know! Isn't it freaky? I knew at a young age I could do the first two. The last one (mirrored and upside down) was just me testing the limits much later on. It's not natural though. I do have to work on that one.

I have this problem too but it is only a language thing in my case. I know very well which way is what, I just forget which side is are called "right" and which is "left". I have to recall it by remembering: "right" is the hand I hold my pen with (and even this sometimes fails because I can kinda use both hands).

When I tell directions to someone I say: "This way <finger point> and then this way <finger point>, and then next to the X building you move like this <hand and body movement> and you see it around there <waving hand>".
I will have a 3D map in my head and I will move myself around the map in my imagination when I say all this. The 3D image in my head is as clear as reality. It doesn't require any "left" or "right".

I believe it is related to visual/nonverbal thinking. It's just not so easy to translate what you clearly see/sense to abstract words like "right" or "left". So yeah, it could be autism thing.

About mirrored and upside down writing - I don't think I was ever good with reading mirrored tests but when I were a kid it made no difference to me if the text was normal or upside down. I could read both almost equally fast. .
Now I lost the ability, or rather - I become very fast in reading normal texts due to lots of practice and the difference between normal and upside down reading speed is now clear. I can still read upside down texts with relative ease, but I prefer normal text and I can only do the "speed reading" techinque with normal text.

I am a very visual thinker to the point where I have trouble processing language, so that could very well be it.

I do exactly the same thing for the same reasons. I orient people to the starting point and direction and do what you said.

Whether autistic or not, I wouldn't know.

I wonder if it may be a word thing with me now that you mention it, since I don't have much trouble with left or right. But, I also know that 'right and left' was literally pounded into me. I can remember that going on until about the age of 8. So, maybe that's why I have no difficulty? Everybody gets that wrong at some point. That's what makes "No, your other left" so funny. It's fairly universal at some point.

I think it's the consistency that's different. And, I will consistently mix up east and west. It's real important too here in NYC because there are a lot east/west distinctions. East side/west side of town. West Village/East Village, Hudson River, East River, and on and on.... I have to pull a mental image of the map in my head, find the compass rose and then deliberately figure the words, east or west. Been here for 26 years and I still have to stop and think about it when getting directions or giving them.

And, I still get it wrong many times.

It just points to the many conflicts/inversions of abilities I display that confuse people and even myself.

I have trouble with east and west too. My usual procedure for remembering which is which is I recall an image of a clock and note what direction the hands are moving, now I know which way is clockwise (which I usually have trouble with as well) and so I can summon an image of the Earth rotating counter clockwise. I then move my perspective to Earth's surface and watch the sunrise, taking note of what direction it is. I know that is east because the Sun always rises in the east. It's a complex procedure, but it works.

Hahahahaha...wanna hear something that happened last night in my class?

I teach 3D graphics. The direction (determined by the x,y,z of the world against the orientation of the creation (say the difference between creating a '3d polygonal 'face' which is made of 3 vertices in space from the front view or the back view) will determine what is the 'face normal.' This means whether the program can 'see it' or not. This is the front face, the default-nonrenderable face is the 'back face.'

Now that I've info dumped, back to the story. So, I was talking about counter clock-wise and clock-wise. While speaking I noticed my hands were tracing the circles backwards (mixed up) so, I started to reverse them to make it correct. Then I realized that the students viewed the backwards tracings as correct, so I flipped back. I thought it was funny because while I was lecturing about it, I was all floopy on the real directions, aware of it and could not settle on something consistent. It was quick enough that it didn't devolve from there from distraction, but wow...

And they say I overthink things...fooey on them......